Possibly one of the most frustrating things that you can suffer from is food intolerances. Unlike food allergies, which can be recognized by the strong and almost immediate reactions, food intolerances are a hit and miss proposition that can make the sufferer crazy. You can spend months avoiding specific foods and still not figure out the cause of your symptoms. In this case a food intolerance test is the logical way to go to find out what is causing your problems.

The first myth that needs to be disregarded is the one that says that people who are sensitive to particular foods are allergic to them. Food allergies and food intolerances are not synonymous. Indications of food allergies occur suddenly and are generally quite violent. Intolerance to food has less drastic symptoms and can take as long as 3 days to appear. Taking a food intolerance test helps you to find out which foods are the main offenders.

When you have a food allergy, you have an allergic reaction to a particular food, and your immune system fights back much the same as it does if you have an allergy to pollen. Food intolerance is different in that the immune system is not involved in the body's reaction.

Your body won't recognize that fact that it has been invaded by an outside substance. However, the places that usually work to eliminate food, like your stomach and intestines, are intolerant to certain parts of the food so will have an adverse reaction to those ingredients.

Food intolerance generally occurs because your body stops producing certain chemicals or enzymes that help in the digestion of that particular food. This happens to quite a number of us as we grow up. This is why so many people are lactose intolerant, as the enzyme produced to properly digest lactose actually decreases in production from the age of 2. It isn't until we are much older that we begin to develop symptoms, which are sometimes quite unpleasant.

There are a couple of ways of discovering which foods you are intolerant to. You can reduce your diet to just a few foods that are known to cause the least amount of problems, brown rice, lamb and water are the common starting foods. After about 3 weeks of eating only these foods you can then reintroduce one food at time, every 3 or 4 days. It is a good idea to keep a very thorough diary to see if you get any reactions. After about 6 to 9 months you should have a clear picture of which foods you have an intolerance to.

An ELISA IgG blood test can determine any food sensitivities that you may have. This is a very efficient test as it uses just one drop of your blood to test for over 200 types of foods. Once you know the foods that you can not tolerate and begin eliminating them from your diet, your digestion will improve as well as your energy and your sleep. Another unexpected benefit that everyone loves is rapid weight loss!